[piosenniel]

OOC: All credit for this scene goes to JRRT, the master writer, and his exquisite telling of The Battle of the Pelennor Fields.

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Bird and Pio advanced upon Maeglin. They cried out in one voice as of old,'Begone foul dwimmerlaik,lord of carrion! Leave the dead in peace!'

'Come not between and elf lord and his prey!'answered the cold voice of Maeglin. 'Or he will not slay you but bring you through darkness, to a place where your flesh will be devoured and you will scream for death.' He hefted a large spar into his grip.

Birdie's sword rang as it cleaved the air in front of Maeglin. 'Do you what you will,' she said,'but I will hinder you if I may!'

'You fool! You cannot hinder me!' screamed the Elf.

'You stand between me and my way back home.' cried Pio, stepping up to Birdie's side. 'Begone if you be not deathless! For living or or dark undead, I will smite you if you do not let us go!'

Rose felt the darkness and confusion of the past days fall from her as she beheld her two companions face the fell specter. She looked toward Pio and Birdie and saw their eyes, grey as the sea, fixed upon the monster, and a fell light shone from them.

Maeglin screamed in rage at the two women who blocked his way, and all his thought was bent on killing them. Pity filled the heart of the little hobbit and great wonder, and suddenly the slow-kindled courage of her race awoke. She clenched her hand. They would not die alone, unaided.

The face of the Elf was turned from Rose. Slowly, slowly she began to crawl aside and toward him. So intent was he on the women before him that he heeded Rose no more than a worm in the mud.

The foul being stepped toward Pio and Birdie and loomed large above them like a bloated shadow. With a cry of hatred that that stung the very ears like venom, he let fall the spar and knocked both women to their knees. They were perilously dazed, and he raised up once again to make the kill.

But suddenly, he too stumbled forward with a cry of bitter pain, and his stroke went wide, driving into the ground. Rose's sword had stabbed him from behind and pierced the sinew behind his mighty knee.

'Pio! Birdie!, cried Rose. Then tottering and struggling up with their last strength, the pair drove their swords between the head and shoulders of the looming specter as it bent over them. Their blades were white hot, and the clothes which had given form to the wraith of Maeglin fell to the ground in front of them in a heap. Pio and Birdie fell forward in a deathly faint upon their fallen foe.

Shapeless the clothes lay now on the ground, torn and tumbled; and a cry went up into the shuddering air, and faded to a shrill wailing, passing with the sea breeze, a voice bodiless and thin that died, and was swallowed up, and was never heard again in that age of the world.

Rose the hobbit stood in the midst of the seeming slain and wept for her fallen friends.

[ June 12, 2002: Message edited by: piosenniel ]